


Snowbound

by rain_sleet_snow



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Academia, Anxiety, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Hermione Granger & Harry Potter Friendship, Lesbian Luna Lovegood, Luna Lovegood is a Good Friend, Only One Bed, POV Hermione Granger, Pre-Relationship, Snowed In
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-28
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-12 12:21:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 786
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29759550
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rain_sleet_snow/pseuds/rain_sleet_snow
Summary: Hermione and Luna pursue postgraduate study, weather or no weather.
Relationships: Hermione Granger & Neville Longbottom & Harry Potter & Ginny Weasley & Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger/Luna Lovegood
Comments: 6
Kudos: 34





	Snowbound

**Author's Note:**

  * For [celeste9](https://archiveofourown.org/users/celeste9/gifts).



“Well,” said Hermione fretfully, pushing back a curtain to stare out of the windows of the Arctic Circle Observatory, “I don’t think we can get out of here by broom.”

Luna, who knew just as well as Hermione that the snow had set in hours ago and was blowing fit to cover the Observatory in drifts, didn’t look up from the book before her. “No. And I don’t think we would have much luck with the Floo, either.”

Hermione contemplated her last attempt at pronouncing Swedish place names, and the smorgasbord of locations they’d run through before finally fetching up at the Observatory courtesy of a nice witch who spoke excellent English and had been quite surprised to find them in her kitchen fire. She winced. Hogwarts taught a lot of subjects, but modern foreign languages did not feature. She supposed the only people at Hogwarts who expected to learn languages either learnt them at their parents’ knees or had private tutors.

Hermione felt stupid, speaking only English. Of course she spoke quite reasonable French - and a little Bulgarian. But here she was wordless, and lacking Luna’s confidence and absence of self-consciousness, she found herself too shy to throw herself into speech. 

And now they were stuck in the Observatory until the storm let up, which could be days. She paced up and down the row of gleaming mahogany tables, thick velvet curtains and heavy carpet muffling her footsteps and the storm alike.

“I haven’t found anything on the Crumple-Horned Snorkack,” Luna said, without lifting her head from the index she was paging through. Her biro scratched thoughtfully against a sheet of paper; she had broken her ink-bottle at the International Portkey Station in Stockholm, and Hermione had run across the road and bought her a packet of Muggle biros with her small store of euros. Luna had taken to them, though she had also taken to charming the ink slightly different colours because the factory standards were not quite satisfactory.

“No?”

“No. But I did find a reference on the aurora borealis you might want to follow.” Luna tore off a strip of paper and laid it before Hermione’s unoccupied seat.

“Oh! Thank you.”

But Hermione didn’t return to her chair. She pushed back the curtain again and stared out into the storm. Maybe it was - nonsense, a Master’s degree by Research, and not even in  _ law _ but certain aspects of the magical interplay between the tides and the aurora, pure arithmancy of a kind that had always appealed to her, stripped of personal complications. But it was a fascinating problem. Ron had pointed out, with characteristic bluntness and a tactician’s mind, that it didn’t serve her purposes or her life plans. Viktor, appealed to by letter for common sense, had replied immediately to say that Hermione was the ultimate source of most of his common sense and he wasn’t going to interfere. Ginny had said it sounded boring.

Harry had asked her if she  _ wanted _ to do it, and when she said yes, had blinked at her as if that was the only answer she needed. Luna, already set on a research trip, had booked a second space on the Portkey schedule. They made it all seem so simple. 

And yet here she was, trapped by this  _ stupid  _ storm -

“What if something goes wrong?” Hermione blurted. “At home.”

“Ginny will deal with it,” Luna said serenely. “Or Neville.”

“Not Harry?” Hermione said almost curiously, letting the curtain fall.

“Oh no,” Luna said, as if this were obvious. “He’s much too nice.”

Hermione stared at the top of Luna’s head, the halo of wild fair hair. “That’s - a good thing,” she said.

“Yes. And a sad impediment to him, in some ways.” Luna swapped her biro for one of a different colour. “But you’d know that - the way you dealt with Marietta.”

Hermione caught her breath. “I’m not proud of that episode.” Marietta had betrayed them - and she knew how serious the consequences might have been, especially for Harry - but she had still been a child. They had all been children.

“If you were I’d be worried.” Luna underlined some parts of her notes, and ruled through others, neatly. “It’s all right, Hermione.”

Hermione drifted back uncertainly to her chair, and sat down. “I don’t even know where we can sleep.”

“They keep rooms for visiting scholars. There’s only one left, but I thought we could share.” 

“I’m afraid I snore.”

“I sleep very heavily,” Luna assured her, and Hermione smiled reluctantly.

“Thank you, Luna. You think of everything.”

She picked up the scrap of paper, and looked it over for a few moments. Then she got up, and went in search of the reference.

  
  



End file.
